At Info-Tech LIVE 2025, Fred Hennige, Director of Enterprise Architecture at Jack in the Box, joined Claire Carpenter, our VP of Sales, North America, for an enlightening fireside chat about how Enterprise Architecture (EA) is revolutionizing decision-making across two organizations. Fred told us how using Ardoq to visualize complex business capabilities and technology landscapes enabled Jack in the Box to navigate exponential change, from digital transformation initiatives to joining with Del Taco.
American fast food chain Jack in the Box acquired the restaurant brand Del Taco in 2022, which means Fred’s work essentially spans two brands. Between them, the brands have nearly 3,000 restaurants across 33 US states. Combined, Jack in the Box and Del Taco franchises 89% of its locations, with the remaining 11% being company-owned.
“We've identified $600,000 in savings potential by rationalizing applications”
Aligning Technology With Business Capabilities
At Fred’s previous organizations, Starbucks and Alaska Airlines, the traditional "boxes and lines" approach to architecture was common. However, upon joining the American fast food chain, Fred saw the need for a more modern, data-driven approach that would facilitate understanding two brands under one umbrella.
Fred realized showing how technology is aligned with business capabilities clearly helps in making business decisions, such as what to keep separate for each brand and what to combine.
“I needed to provide the linkage between the technology under the hood and the way the business operated to make smart decisions about where to pull things together and where to keep them separate.”
- Fred Hennige, Director of Enterprise Architecture at Jack in the Box
An example of this was in how Jack in the Box completely overhauled their mobile app. The EA team considered how Del Taco’s digital infrastructure and marketing capabilities could be aligned or adapted. This required a comprehensive analysis of both brands' customer, digital, and technological capabilities and the consideration of different approaches to integration. By leveraging Ardoq, Fred was able to identify both quick wins for both brands as well as strategic actions that take far more time and planning to execute.
Fred told us that in their first year using Ardoq, Jack in the Box had identified $600,000 in savings potential by rationalizing applications across the brands’ digital strategies. Supporting them in this effort was Slalom, a leading consulting firm and trusted Ardoq partner.
Creating a Common Understanding Between IT and Business
In bridging the gap between IT and business, EAs need to be able to speak “executive.” Using Ardoq, Fred can create both high-level business visualizations for executives and detailed pictures for the IT team, minimizing the time spent between creating a story and telling it. This aids decision-making—something vital in a business that moves as quickly as the fast food sector does.
As Fred’s team was sourcing business capabilities, they realized that each brand had a different way of thinking about and operating their sales departments. They needed to normalize the language and provide a common understanding.
“Words matter, language is hard” became a saying in business to emphasize the importance of standardizing terminology and the time this can save in decision-making.
Engaging the Business
Getting the business to understand the value of EA and facilitating their contributions can be tricky, but it’s vital to maintaining up-to-date architecture. Fred suggested beginning with building strong relationships and speaking your audience’s language. Some stakeholders were uncertain about what business capabilities were until Fred explained they were essentially the functions they performed to get their jobs done.
“Be very targeted in the outcomes you want to achieve—it’s very easy as an architect to get pulled off in a direction that isn’t outcomes-based. Being outcome aligned makes it much easier to get engagement and understand the value that is there.”
Fred used Ardoq’s Surveys to engage with business owners and source key information to build up his understanding of the organization. He learned stakeholders can be quite different in how they approach surveys, depending upon how comfortable they are with the survey subject. One person was very careful to ensure they understood the question and provided correct information, while another was happy to respond from the hip. A third was uncomfortable with thinking of themselves as owners and the responsibilities involved. Fred learned that he had to be very clear in his survey language about exactly what was needed and not to scare responders off.
The Impact of Being Data-Driven
Cataloging information about technology and business capabilities in Ardoq became particularly useful when a key subject matter expert left the organization. Using Ardoq, Jack in the Box was able to see and visualize the business impact this would have on their digital capabilities and realize what gaps this would leave in the business—not just in technology but also in skills. This can be referred to as “business blast radius” and is a good way of showing the scope of impact that individuals can have on business capabilities—a key way to demonstrate the value of EA to business leaders beyond technology.
Overcoming Initial EA Challenges
Constructing and maintaining enterprise architecture across two brands is challenging, and it can be hard to know how to start. Fred’s starting point was the business capabilities, ensuring he knew what was happening in the business and where.
Ardoq’s pre-made best practice Solutions provided a quick way to kick off key initiatives such as Application Rationalization and Application Lifecycle Management. Onto this, Jack in the Box were able to add organizational design components to fully understand their IT and business landscape.
The most difficult challenge for Fred to overcome initially was deciding how to import the data he needed into Ardoq. From this experience, he has a crucial tip:
“If you’re starting off as an Ardoq customer, set up separate workspaces to test drive all your imports before building your projects.”
Future Plans for EA
Fred has a roadmap that stretches over three years to fill in EA practice gaps in business capabilities, technologies, and strategic execution. His ultimate goal is for the executives to feel comfortable using EA initiatives and tools to make strategic decisions to achieve their business visions.
